Article XIII: Record Retention and Public Access

§ 38A-13.1 Record retention.

The County shall maintain such written records as required by this policy and applicable law. All records and contract documents shall be maintained for at least five years after the County makes final payment and all other pending matters have concluded with respect to any given procurement transaction.

§ 38A-13.2 Public access to procurement information.

Except as provided herein, all proceedings, records, contracts and other public records relating to procurement transactions shall be open to the inspection of any citizen, or any interested person, firm or corporation, in accordance with the Virginia Freedom of Information Act (Code of Virginia, § 2.2-3700 et seq.).

Cost estimates relating to a proposed transaction prepared by or for the County shall not be open to public inspection.

Any competitive sealed bidder, upon request, shall be afforded the opportunity to inspect bid records within a reasonable time after the opening of all bids but prior to award, except in the event that the County rejects all bids and reopens the contract. Otherwise, bid and proposal records shall be open to public inspection only after award of the contract.

Any competitive negotiation offeror, upon request, shall be afforded the opportunity to inspect proposal records within a reasonable time after the evaluation and negotiations of proposals are completed but prior to award, except in the event that the County decides not to accept any of the proposals and to reopen the contract. Otherwise, proposal records shall be open to public inspection only after award of the contract.

Any inspection of procurement transaction records under this section shall be subject to reasonable restrictions to ensure the security and integrity of the records.

Trade secrets or proprietary information submitted by a bidder, offeror or contractor in connection with a procurement transaction or prequalification application shall not be subject to public disclosure under the Virginia Freedom of Information Act; however, the bidder, offeror or contractor must invoke the protections of this section prior to or upon submission of the data or other materials, identify the data or other materials to be protected and state the reasons why protection is necessary. A bidder, offeror or contractor shall not designate as trade secrets or proprietary information: 1) an entire bid, proposal or prequalification application; 2) any portion of a bid, proposal or prequalification application that does not contain trade secrets or proprietary information; or 3) line item prices or total bid, proposal or prequalification application prices.